Lesser known facts about your iPhone and iDevices

Jarrod Mckinney’s, iPhone 4 had been shattered in the past when it had slipped the hands of his 2-year old son. So, when it left his pocket and fell from a distance of 13,500 Ft, he had lost all hope of his iPhone ever surviving this fatal crash.

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To his amazement he found his iPhone, only screen shattered but otherwise, in perfect working condition. McKinney, 37-year-old from Minnesota, had lost his phone while skydiving. His gadget did not land on grass and trees, instead Mckinney and his diving buddies claim that the gadget fell on top of a two-storey building and was tracked using the Apple’s GPS tracking app. The consequences of this mishap did not cost Mckinney much and left him a tale to tell about his iPhone surviving the crash.

Did you ever notice that the time displayed on the Apple devices for promotional events is always set to 9:41. On January 9, 2007, it was at this iconic time that Steve Jobs had announced the launch of first iPhone. However, this time previously used to be 9:42 cause it was at this time the first picture of iPhone popped up on the screen behind Jobs and the time displayed was 9:42. It was later changed to 9:41. In a conversation with the Australian app developer, Jon Manning, the iOS Chief Scott Forstall confronted that they design the Keynotes in the presentation to last 40 minutes before the big image with product appears on the screen and they intend to keep the time close to time on audience’s watches.

Ever wondered whose image silhouette is present in the “All Artists” icon in the iTunes app. This silhouette is of Bono, the primary lyricist of the band U2. Apple also gave away a free copy of the U2’s new album ‘Songs of Innocence’ to every iTunes user. However, this upset a lot of people including U2 fans and they vocally protested. Apple was ultimately forced to remove the icon and issue a tool, for the users to permanently remove it from their account. All said and done, but for some time there was a Bono hiding in every iPhone.

Apple has a small market share of 18.3% in the smartphone industry but bags a massive profit of whopping 92% (as of 2015), claiming a majority of the profit of this industry. Since the launch of iPhone 6 and 6 Plus, the company has seen the most profitable quarter ever. Good times seem to be rolling for Apple as the tech firm continues to plan and build next-generation phones for its customers, leaving other smartphone companies lagging behind.

iPhone and iOS have become a staple name for the Apple’s core, but little did we knew that Silicon Valley-based company, Cisco owned the trademarks for both these terms, long before Apple stapled them to its products. Cisco had reserved the name for its core equipment-Internet operating system, years before, Jobs labelled the iPhone’s software as iOS. A legal battle started between the Apple’s legal department and the Cisco’s private equity firm, Silver Lake Partners as Cisco filed the suit. With the smart negotiation tactics of Steve Jobs, Cisco gave up the fight and the two sides reached an agreement on areas of mutual benefit. Thus Apple was able to acquire the trademark before going public with the terms.

Michael Kovatch, an entrepreneur owned the domain name-iphone.com and planned to build his internet phone company around it. Kovatch probably paid a considerably small amount for it in 1995 but sold the domain for a skyrocketed seven-figure amount to Steve and Co. iPhone.com could have been the best name for the Apple iPhone company and it was sheer good luck for Kovatch as the world’s smartphone leader (at present) happened to launch a product by the same name, making him a millionaire instantly.

Innovative and ‘cool’ was the hotly contested invention of Apple named Cover flow. It lets the user listen to their favourite music with just a click, and the user is transported to the section where he/she can browse all the songs and album as required. Before 2011 the iPod makers could not call it their own as they were sued in 2008 by other such creators. They won the patent in 2011 for ‘User interface selection from media collection’. This GUI was originally created by the developer firm Steel Skies and Apple purchased it in 2006 and since have been using them on all iDevices.

Cydia pomonella translates to “the worm in the apple”, but in the jailbreak community, this “codding moth” is staple name. For if one has a jailbroken iOS device then they most likely have used Cydia. It is quite like the worm but for all Apple’s devices. Cydia was created by Jay Freeman in 2008 as an alternative installer.app. Cydia acts like the app store for the jailbreakers and comprises the whole host of tweaks, mods, themes, apps and all that is required to modify your iDevice, which Apple does not permit to do. With new idevices release, this term is gaining further ground amongst the average user, making it typical ‘AppleWorm’

Published by Saalmanjika Jaiswal

Saalmanjika is an MBA in Marketing and graduated with Bachelor in Pharmacy. She has an inclination towards writing and blogging . In her free time she enjoys playing the synthesizer and fancies sketching. She is an avid writer and often contributes to various blogs and websites. View more posts